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Since the whole demon-summoning, jumping into literal hell, stabbing her best friend fiasco, sleep has been just as difficult as Lydia would have expected. Nights consist of hours spent lying awake, and then dreams that she wouldn’t quite call nightmares, but are still bad enough for her to not want to go back to bed. Having a spare set of parental figures that don’t need sleep helps a bit, but there’s nights when she just needs to crawl into bed with her dad.
This is not one of those nights, because it’s not the guilt or trauma or existential dread keeping her awake. It’s the arsehole that chose to throw rocks at her window at 4AM.
Rubbing at her eyes, Lydia drags herself out of bed and over to her window. She feels oddly certain of the culprit despite its improbability, and sure enough when she looks down there’s a striped idiot on the lawn. For a moment Lydia just stares through the glass at him, dumbfounded, until another rock makes her flinch. Great, he’s seen her now.
She heaves open the window, and has to duck before the next rock gives her a concussion.
“What the fuck, man?” she hisses down at the guy she murdered a few months ago.
“Good to see you too, Scarecrow.” A rock bounces off her window frame.
“What- Why are you here?”
“Oh, y’know. I was in town.” He lobs another rock at her. “Wanna get divorced?”
“What?”
“Divorce. You want one?”
“I-” she has to duck again. “Will you stop that?!”
“Hang on, I got one more.” He throws it, and it glances off the drainpipe as he shoves his hands into his pockets, looking up at her expectantly.
“Why do we need a divorce?” Lydia asks. “I thought the deal was ‘till death do us part’?”
“Lyds, what part of ‘cursed bride’ implied this was a lifetime-only thing?”
“We’re still married? Why the hell wouldn’t you tell me that?!”
“It wasn’t relevant until you stabbed me, and at that point I was kinda distracted by you stabbing me.”
“...Fair point,” she has to admit. “You’ve had a while since then, though.”
“Look, do you want the divorce or not?”
Lydia takes a moment to think about it.
“Are there any, like, afterlife tax benefits to marriage or anything?”
“No, not really.”
“That sucks.”
“You’re telling me. So is that a yes?”
“Yeah, alright.”
They meet in the living room, Lydia just a little unsettled by the reminder that the demon can walk right in through the house’s walls with no issue. He’s already waiting when she gets there; she had to take the time to get dressed, she’s not doing this in her old cat pyjamas. Beetlejuice already has a stick of chalk ready, tossing it from hand to hand as she tiptoes down the stairs.
“Bringing the camera?” he asks, eyeing the device in her hands.
“You think I’m not getting pictures of this?”
“Yeah, well, good luck finding anything that shows up on film.” He turns towards the wall.
“Do I get half your demonic estate?” Lydia asks as he sets to drawing them a door.
“Hate to break it to you, but half of zero is zero.”
“Well do I get demonic alimony, at least? You’ve gotta make more than me, on account of me not having a job. On account of me being a child. On account of you marrying a child.”
“Are you seriously coming at me for that now? Of all times?”
“It’s an incredibly relevant time.”
Beetlejuice rolls his eyes, tossing the chalk aside. He pauses for a moment, thinking, and then beats a quick pattern of knocks into the door. It cracks, a thin, stale-smelling smoke creeping out into the house once more. Beetlejuice pushes it the rest of the way open, and then stands aside.
“After you, dearest.”
“Gross.”
The void they step out into is distinctly different to the void from last time, somehow. When Lydia relays this to Beetlejuice he wrinkles his nose, considering it.
“Not so fresh over here, I guess. Didn’t think you’d be sensitive enough to pick up on that.”
Lydia can’t help feeling some sort of pride at the thought that she’s a particularly notable medium.
“...Or it’s just a new theatre, I dunno.”
“Huh?”
“Nevermind. C’mon.”
Together, the two of them trudge deeper into the darkness. Lydia raises her camera, aiming it at the ribs of white light that split the void. When the polaroid scrolls out of its slot it seems to have already developed, though not at all how she expected. Those ribs didn’t photograph, they burned into the film. Lydia slips it into her pocket, and raises the camera again.
“Hey, what’s that?”
She lowers her camera, pointing. Just as in the middle of nowhere as the scanner-doorway had been the last time, there’s now a desk.
“Legal department,” Beetlejuice answers simply.
They seem to reach the desk far quicker than they should, for how far away it seemed. Under the piles and piles of jumbled paperwork, it’s a fairly nice looking old desk. Adam would probably like it. Beetlejuice doesn’t seem to pay it much attention, focusing instead on jabbing at the bell sitting on one of the stacks of papers.
Dingdingdingdingding-
“Is that some sort of cursed artifact?” Lydia asks.
“Hm?”
“Well there’s nobody around to hear it normally, so-”
“What do you-? oh, it’s you.”
Lydia startles, head whipping around towards the new voice. She’d only looked away from the desk for a moment to talk to Beetlejuice, but apparently that was long enough for a familiar green-skinned woman to appear.
“And this little girl again?! I bet she’s still alive, isn’t she?” She grabs Lydia’s arm, feeling for a pulse, and after a moment gives Beetlejuice a thoroughly unimpressed look.
“Why?” she asks simply, dropping Lydia’s arm.
“Divorce,” he responds in kind.
The woman looks from one to the other of them. “Div- Betelgeuse, how old is this girl?”
“I dunno, just kinda a nonspecific teenage-”
“You don’t know?!”
“No, I wasn’t- It was a green card thing, for fuck’s-”
“Oh, of course! Idiot! So how come you’re still…” She gestures vaguely to him with unmasked distaste.
“I stabbed him,” Lydia says.
For the first time, the ghost’s expression softens slightly. “Good for you, sweetheart.”
“Yeah, didn’t quite work out,” Beetlejuice admits. “Hence the whole untying the knot thing.”
The ghost gives an exasperated sigh. “Sit down.”
Beetlejuice takes a seat, leaning back and resting one ankle on the opposite thigh. Lydia follows. The chair is plush, but musty-smelling.
“So,” Beetlejuice says. “Are we still doing no-fault down here or do I need to go take a trip to Dante’s?”
The ghost doesn’t look up from the drawer she’s opened in the desk. “Girl’s already stabbed you, I think that would count as a fault. But I will not be dragging this out that long.”
“Thanks, Argie.”
“Not for your sake, Betel. I have things to do and I’m sure this little girl has better things to be doing too.”
Lydia gives him a shit-eating grin. “Dude, our divorce lawyer likes me more than you. You’re so cooked.”
“I am not your lawyer.” She slaps a yellowed form down on the desk. “Which one of you is filing?”
Lydia looks at Beetlejuice.
“What?” he asks.
“You’re the one who was throwing rocks at my window asking to do this.”
“Ugh, fine.”
With that, Lydia sets to amusing herself with photographing probably-confidential clutter that she probably shouldn’t be photographing. Beetlejuice turns back to the ghost.
“Hit me.”
“Your full name?” the ghost asks, picking up a pen.
“Lawrence can’t-say-it Shoggoth.”
“Her full name?”
Beetlejuice gives Lydia a sideways glance. “It’s Deep, right?”
“Lydia Deetz. Also, Lawrence?”
“Shuttup.”
“Dissolution of cross-veil marriage?”
“Yup.”
“And you’ve been dead how long?”
“This go-around? I dunno, I wasn’t looking at a calendar while the kid stabbed me.”
“For all of our sakes, I’m going to assume you’ve been a Netherworld citizen long enough for you to file.”
“Thanks, Argie.”
“If it is wrong and it is found out, I will blame you.” She scribbles in a few boxes. “Date of marriage?”
Beetlejuice looks at Lydia again. She rolls her eyes.
“Twenty-fifth of April.”
“Date of separation?”
“Twenty-fifth of April.”
Lydia watches the ghost write two large zeros against years and months between those two events. And then she looks up at Beetlejuice with a glare.
“There better not be any minor children involved. Aside the obvious.”
She points the end of her pen towards Lydia. Beetlejuice shakes his head vigorously.
“Good. Now, I am putting you down for irreconcilable differences. I assume you didn’t have the time to acquire any separate or shared property?”
Beetlejuice sighs wistfully. “Only the memories.”
“And the trauma,” Lydia adds.
“And the trauma,” Beetlejuice nods.
“And the stab wound.”
“And the stab wound.”
The ghost doesn’t look all that amused. “Just sign the paper.”
She turns the paper around, and hands over the pen. Beetlejuice’s signature seems to consist of a doodle of a bug. The ghost fills a scant few boxes on the second page, and then sets them both on top of the pile of polaroids that has built up in front of Lydia.
“You’ve been served. There’s your petition, and there’s your summons.”
Lydia raises an eyebrow. “I’m already here.”
“How unfortunate for all of us. You need to respond.”
She takes out a form that looks suspiciously similar to the one she filled out for Beetlejuice.
“Damnit, I thought I was shoving all that onto him.”
“Sucks to suck,” Beetlejuice informs her, gathering up her polaroids to begin an attempt at a house of cards.
It is, in fact, mostly the same questions that the ghost runs through with Lydia, and mostly the same answers. The temptation is strong to write in some stupid petty demand, just to annoy Beej - take all his left shoes or something - but she’s somewhat scared of how the ghost will respond to any attempt to drag this out. So her response ends up more or less identical to the petition. The ghost holds them both, looking them over, and then glances up at Beetlejuice and Lydia.
“I’ll write up the agreement for you. You both retain all premarital assets. No strings attached.” Her tone suggests that any requests for strings are, as Lydia suspected, by no means welcome. She moves a typewriter to the middle of the table. Lydia takes the pen, and begins flicking it towards Beetlejuice’s polaroid house of cards. It holds up surprisingly well, until the ghost unapologetically sweeps his progress away and throws the paper down in front of them.
“You both sign this, I’ll give you a decree, and we’re done here.”
“That’s it?” Lydia asks as Beetlejuice takes the pen offered to him. “We don’t have to go in front of a judge or something?”
“Don’t have judges here,” Beetlejuice tells her. “No justice in death, or whatever.”
As he starts scribbling his beetle again, Lydia elbows him in the side.
“What?”
She holds up her camera. “Divorce selfie?”
“Absolutely.”
They snap a picture of the two of them with the papers. Or two. Or three. Lydia sticking two fingers up behind Beetlejuice’s head. Him sticking two fingers up behind hers. Their hands together forming a heart over the word ‘divorce’. The ghost’s head is in her hands in the background of most of them. And then Beetlejuice slides the papers across the desk to Lydia.
“I now declare us bitter exes,” she says, signing a flourish.
“May our failed marriage be a burden on whoever we complain to,” Beetlejuice solemnly nods.
“If I hadn’t already stabbed you, would this have killed you?”
“Not sure the audience would have been as into it, but probably. What a way to go.”
Seeming more than ready to get this over with, the ghost takes the papers behind the desk and opens a drawer. There’s a light and a sound like a copier, and then two thumps of rubber stamps. Lydia and Beetlejuice are each presented with their own identically yellowed and worn clones of the divorce papers, stamped with OFFICIAL COPY. Beetlejuice tucks his inside his jacket.
“Now please get that girl out of here. I can’t be the one explaining this mess.”
“On it,” Beetlejuice says, digging in his pocket for the chalk as he stands. “I owe you one.”
“Yes. Yes, you do.”
He flashes her a grin, and then gestures with his head for Lydia to follow him. She quickly piles her handful of polaroids on top of the papers and scoops the whole thing up to hurry after him. He’s somehow identified a solid wall to draw on that Lydia can’t distinguish from the void around it. Three knocks, and it cracks open, showing a sliver of her living room. She looks up at Beetlejuice.
“See you around?”
He grins. “Never gonna miss a chance to bother my ex wife.”
“I’ll hold you to that.”
The sound of the old stairs creaking echoes through the door. Looks like she’s been gone long enough that it’s morning on the other side. At least, she hopes she’s only been gone that long.
“Been great signing paperwork with you, but I should go before I end up as a missing person’s case.”
She slips through the chalk door just as her dad is trudging down the stairs. He pauses, eyes bleary with sleep, apparently needing a moment to register her walking in through the wall.
“...What have you been up to?”
Slipping the polaroids into her pocket, Lydia holds up her paperwork. “Getting a divorce.”
Her dad squints at it for a moment, then trudges the rest of the way down to take it from her hand and get a closer look. He rubs sleep from his eyes as he leafs through the papers.
“You should have woken me up, Pumpkin,” he says, voice still thick with sleep. “I could have found you a good lawyer.”
“Dad, I think dragging someone else into me and Beej’s mess could be constituted as a war crime.”
“That’s… a point.”
“You seem very calm about this.”
“Lydia, Pumpkin, I live in a haunted house and it’s far too early in the morning to pretend I’m still shocked by this kind of thing.” He kisses the top of her head. “Now how about we make you some post-divorce pancakes?”